348 PAPERS RELATING TO THE [May 11, 1857. 



very able Surveyor-General, Colonel Waugh, to be upwards of 

 29,000 feet high, and consequently to be the loftiest, yet known, 

 peak of the Himalaya. 



Agreeing as I do with Colonel Waugh in the propriety of adopt- 

 ing native names, and cordially sympathising with the sentiment 

 which gave rise to the name Mount Everest, I trust I may be per- 

 mitted, without offence, to state, in justice to my friends the 

 Kepalese and to myself, who have been so long connected with 

 them, that the mountain in question does not lack a native and 

 ascertained name ; that that name is Devadhunga, Holy hill, or 

 Mons Sacer ; and that it is expressly referred to under that name in 

 our Journal. To the paper styled ' Eoute from Kathmandu to 

 Darjiling,' there is appended a ' Memorandum relative to the seven 

 Cosis.' In the latter occurred the following words : " The Bhotia 

 Cosi " has its source at Deodhiinga, a vast Himalayan peak situated 

 60 to 70 miles east of Gosainthan, and which Colonel Waugh con- 

 jectures may rival Kunchenginga in height." In the rude sketch 

 map which accompanied that paper,, Deodhiinga was set down in 

 the position indicated, and that that position tallies with the site 

 of Mount Everest, is clear from the words above quoted, since 

 "60 to 70 miles east of Gosainthan," answers precisely to east 

 longitude 87°, Gosainthan being in 86° east longitude. 



Other indications equally correspond, and at the same time show 

 why such an object could not remain unnamed or unascertained. 



Thus Devadhunga and Mount Everest are both " about 100 miles 

 N.E. of Kathmandu ;" both are midway between Gosainthan and 

 Kangchan ; and, lastly, both are by their position and by the 

 absence of any like mass of snow in all the intervals between those 

 peaks, identifiable with the so-sailed Kiitighat, or the great Gatey 

 which annually for half the year is closed by Winter upon the 

 Eastern highway of Nepalese commerce and intercourse with Tibet 

 and China. 



A few words more may be given to this last point, as being the 

 matter which chiefly fixed my attention, as a political officer in 

 Nepal, on the site of Mount Everest, and enabled me at once, when 

 I heard in after years surmises of the great height of a peak in that 

 direction, to fix on Devadhunga, or Bhairavthan (both names are 

 used) as being the " enormous snow mass " in question ; and I have 

 often of late repeated this here, very recently to Mr. Blanford. 

 Round the shoulder of Devadhunga runs, as above intimated, the 

 great Eastern highway (the western being round the shoulder of 

 Gosainthan) of the merchants and envoys of Nepal proceeding to 

 Lassa and Pekin ; and this passage along the shoulder of the huge. 



